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Dragon Ball Z: Budokai
Dragon Ball Z: Budokai, released as Dragon Ball Z (ドラゴンボールZ, Doragon Bōru Zetto) in Japan, is a fighting video game developed by Dimps and published by Atari. It was released for the PlayStation 2 in December 2002 in North America and for the Nintendo GameCube in North America on October 2003. The game was released in Japan by Bandai on the PlayStation 2 in February 13, 2003, while the Nintendo GameCube release was brought out near the end of the year, on November 28, 2003. As the GameCube version was released almost a year after the PlayStation 2 version, the opportunity was taken to improve the graphics using cel-shading. The game is re-rendered in HD in the 2012 video game Dragon Ball Z: Budokai HD Collection for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, though anything outside of battle gameplay is displayed in 4:3 instead of 16:9. Gameplay Battle The objective of each battle is to deplete your opponent's health bar. Battles take place on a 2.5D plane, where characters may move around. To unleash super attacks, characters must use up a certain number of Ki bars on the Ki gauge. Characters can also transform, where they gain super attacks and increased strength. Skills Each character can be optionally customized by using a 7-slot skill tray; players may choose up to 7 skills and assign them to the fighter of their choice. Some skills can take up multiple slots. Skills may be purchased from Mr. Popo in the Edit Skills mode using the prize money from the World Tournament mode. There are three types of skills: *'Special Moves', which include skills such as the Kamehameha and the ability to become Super Saiyan. *'Physical', which includes such skills as Zanku Fist. *'Equipment', which includes skills such as the Senzu Bean. One can also purchase Dragon Balls, and when all of them are collected, Oolong appears and summons Shenron, giving the player a choice of three Breakthrough Capsules; these allow a player to use all of a character's moves and abilities at once at the cost of every slot in the skill tray. Game modes Story Mode The Story Mode consists of 3D cutscenes adapted from the series (though more close to the manga than the anime). Unlike later Budokai games, the story mode is similar to most other fighting games (in which cutscenes occur between battles). The story mode covers 3 Sagas: Saiyan, Namekian, Android Sagas. The player automatically collects capsules (or sometimes Dragon Balls and characters) at the end of each battle. Also, more levels are unlocked during a second playthrough. At the end of every saga there are bonus "what if" episodes, and one plays as the main villain of that saga; Vegeta, Frieza and Cell respectively: *In Vegeta's storyline, "Vegeta, Saiyan Prince", Vegeta and Goku duel, and Vegeta defeats him with minimum effort, driven by the desire to avenge Nappa's defeat (though he himself killed Nappa, he still feels for his comrade's demise). Then Krillin and Gohan turn up, and Vegeta beats them separately. After the battle, Yajirobe sneaks up behind Vegeta but he is heard. Impressed by Yajirobe's stealthiness, Vegeta offers him to become his next pupil. Yajirobe refuses, stating that he does not want to end up like Nappa. Infuriated at being reminded of Nappa's death, Vegeta goes Super Saiyan in anger, leaving Yajirobe terrified. *In Frieza's storyline, "Raging Frieza/The True Ruler", Frieza successfully beats Krillin, Gohan, Piccolo, Vegeta, and Goku in battle. He then succeeds in wishing for immortality. Blowing up Namek, Frieza returns to his spaceship and decides to head for Earth with the intention of destroying it. *In Cell's storyline, "Aim For Perfect Form!/A Cold-Blooded Assassin", Cell attempts to absorb Android 17 and Android 18, and successfully beats Android 16 in battle. He then absorbs 17, but while attempting to absorb 18, Krillin intervenes. Though Cell wins the ensuing fight, Krillin uses his last strength to push 18 aside, causing Cell to accidentally absorb Krillin and lose a lot of power. Yamcha and Tien Shinhan then show up to challenge the weakened Cell. He barely manages to beat Yamcha, but he is then destroyed by Tien. The real Cell then wakes up in the middle of the Cell Ring, realizing that it was a nightmare, and saying to himself that ten days was too long to wait for the Cell Games. World Tournament The World Tournament allows players to compete against a computer-controlled character in a Martial Arts Tournament. The Prizes can be the following: *Novice: 10,000 Zeni *Adept: 30,000 Zeni *Advance: 50,000 Zeni Dueling Dueling mode allows a player to fight a computer-controlled character at a preset skill level, or two human players to fight each other using any custom skills. A player may also watch a fight between two computer-controlled fighters. Legend of Hercule Legend of Hercule (Legend of Mr. Satan in the European and Japanese versions) is an optional mode unlocked through capsules. In this mode, players control Hercule as he defeats several opponents, arcade-style. Some fights have special conditions, such as only using Ki to attack, or defeating the opponent within a time limit. The final opponent is Perfect Cell. Characters Playable characters Unplayable/Story-only characters The following are characters that only appear in Story Mode as the controlled character, as an enemy, or in cutscenes. They are not playable in any other mode. *Bulma – Cutscene character *Master Roshi – Cutscene character *Chi-Chi – Cutscene character *Yajirobe – Cutscene character *Mr. Popo – Cutscene character *Korin – Cutscene character *Kami – Cutscene character *King Kai – Cutscene character *Bubbles – Cutscene character *Gregory – Cutscene character *Cellin – Story-only character *Cell Jr. – Unplayable character *Saibaman – Unplayable character *Cui – Cutscene character *Burter – Cutscene character *Jeice – Cutscene character *Guldo – Cutscene character *Chiaotzu – Cutscene character *Dr. Gero – Cutscene character Battle Stages *Cell Games Ring *Planet Namek *Valley Plains *World Match *Grassland *Time-Soul Room *Wasteland *Islands *Kami's Lookout Voice cast The North American version contains the voices from the FUNimation dub of the anime series, with all other localized versions containing the original Japanese dub with subtitles. Reception The game has received less than favorable reviews; many critics complained about its simple interface and the fact that combos were not worth the payoff. Some also complained about the graphics. The game has received a 68% on Game Rankings. The game has sold 3,090,000 units on the PS2[http://www.vgchartz.com/game/5029/dragon-ball-z-budokai/ Dragon Ball Z: Budokai PS2 sales at vgchartz.com] and 690,000 units on GameCube,[http://www.vgchartz.com/game/573/dragon-ball-z-budokai/ Dragon Ball Z: Budokai GameCube sales at vgchartz.com] thus selling a combined 3,780,000 on both the platforms, as of January 5, 2013. This makes it the best-selling Dragon Ball-related game of all time as of January 5, 2013. Prima's Official Strategy Guide The strategy guide was released in 2002. In the book, it goes into a rather in-depth walkthrough, fighting mechanics, character biographies, and rarity of all the capsules. Despite this, the guide had many problems, such as Yamcha's and Hercule's hair being different from the anime (the latter is seen in various pictures with his afro). Several ultimates are skipped (such as Gohan's Super Kamehameha, Piccolo's Hellzone Grenade, and Goku's Warp Kamehameha). Even transformations are skipped, and Piccolo's are misspelled. There is also a Limited Edition DVD with an episode of Dragon Ball GT, YuYu Hakusho and several trailers. The book also gives a very small preview to Dragon Ball Z: Taiketsu, while the DVD features an entire "sizzle" video. Sequels There are three sequels to the game released on the same platform: Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 2 (Dragon Ball Z 2 V), Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 3, and Dragon Ball Z: Infinite World. Also, the game was re-rendered in HD in the 2012 Dragon Ball Z: Budokai HD Collection for PS3 and Xbox 360. Several improvements to Budokai 1 are added in the HD Collection: the option for the second and computer players on the right side to choose the "custom" setting when choosing a character, new transitions between the story video and fight scenes in the form of a "Z" that goes out on each side in the story mode, and a new title sequence comprised of scenes from the game interspliced with each other rather than just set the original sequence to "Cha-La Head-Cha-La" (the first opening song from the TV series). The ''Budokai Tenkaichi'' series, which started in fall 2005, is a separate series from the Budokai series; it was developed by Spike instead of Dimps and features a radically different fighting engine. In its place of origin, Japan, it is known as Dragon Ball Z Sparking!, but was renamed for worldwide release to capitalize on the popularity of the Budokai brand. Trivia *The opening from the Japanese version featured "Cha-La Head-Cha-La". It was replaced in the American version with the first US theme song, "Rock the Dragon". However, the end credits featured "Cha-La Head-Cha-La" instrumentals. For some reason the opening used in the European version was just made of clips from the Story Mode, and had different music. Speculation led lots to believe it was due to most of the European audience not seeing the proper introduction the anime had, although it was actually seen in some countries like Spain. It's more likey that the 3D animation of the intro wasn't ready when the PS2 PAL version of the game got released. *On the dueling image on the main menu and the PAL boxart, Vegeta is in his Buu Saga attire. Also on the PAL boxart Vegeta from Buu Saga is seen in the bottom corner with Spopovich, and on the back side Majin Vegeta is seen with Babidi, Majin Buu and Dabura. However Majin Vegeta, Babidi, Majin Buu and Dabura do not appear in the game (they all appear in the Majin Buu Saga, which is not in the game). These characters are removed from the cover art used for the Platinum re-release. *The Kamehameha attack is yellow for everyone except for Cell, while in the anime, it is blue. In the colored page of the manga, though, the Kamehameha is most of the time yellow. *Piccolo's Special Beam Cannon would be purple from this game to the end of the ''Budokai'' series. *Unlike later games in which transforming gave a slight percentage of attack increasement, each transformation in Budokai gives each character a 10% attack increase, making characters who can transform the most powerful characters in the game, though the ki consumption rate was incredibly high as characters transformed. Other Budokai games (excluding the Budokai Tenkaichi games) gives characters smaller increases or fixed increases depending on transformations, being no more than 10% extra for each transformation (this makes Goku theoretically the strongest character in terms of sheer attack power since he has the most transformations, though the ki consumption at the point of his Super Saiyan form requires a lot of ki charging and even then is easy to fall to lesser forms). *During the story mode's cutscenes inside Kame House, a book on Master Roshi's table has a blurred image of the cover for the first ''Dragon Ball'' manga volume. *In the first scene from the level "Show Gohan's True Power", Great Ape Vegeta is crushing Goku then says "That power level...where?". This is a goof because Vegeta could not sense power levels until the Namek Saga. *In the scene from "A Wicked Omen", when Piccolo sees Cell for the first time, he says Cell you monster! which is an error because Piccolo did not know who Cell was when he confronted him. *During one of the game's cutscenes, Imperfect Cell is given the same voice as Perfect Cell while he is saying "Nothing can stop me from fulfilling my design! I am perfect!" Also, Imperfect Cell's voice is retained throughout his transformations during battle; this may be due to the fact that most characters' voices are not expected to change after transformation, as this also occurs with Zarbon in his monster form. However, aside from cutscenes, Perfect Cell's actual voice can be heard when launching the Spirit Bomb. *This is the only game in the Budokai series to have Future Trunks' Ascended Super Saiyan form, as well as Cell's Power-Weighted form. This is also the only Budokai game to feature Android 19, Zarbon and Dodoria as playable characters. *This is the only game to have Gohan's outfit from the 10 day-time period before the Cell Games and Vegeta's outfit from the episode "Granddaughter Pan", but with Vegeta's pants being black instead of khaki. *The alternate costume for Nappa in Duel, Practice and World Tournament is the same as Vegeta's blue suit. *Nail appears as an Alternate Costume for Piccolo. *Originally, the European version of the game called Mr. Satan by his original name, but this was changed to Hercule in later releases. *Once all the Breakthrough Capsules are obtained, the Dragon Balls can be purchased one last time. However, they will be of no use afterwards, making them nothing more than showcase items. Gallery References External links *Official page from PlayStation website *[http://ps2.ign.com/articles/379/379000p1.html?fromint=1 Dragon Ball Z: Budokai review at IGN] *''Dragon Ball Z: Budokai''at Game Rankings Category:Dragon Ball games Category:Fighting games Category:Video Games Category:Video games where Android 16 is playable Category:Video games where Android 17 is playable Category:Video games where Android 18 is playable Category:Video games where Android 19 is playable Category:Video games where Captain Ginyu is playable Category:Video games where Cell is playable Category:Video games where Dodoria is playable Category:Video games where Frieza is playable Category:Video games where Gohan is playable Category:Video games where Goku is playable Category:Video games where Krillin is playable Category:Video games where Mr. Satan is playable Category:Video games where Nappa is playable Category:Video games where Piccolo is playable Category:Video games where Raditz is playable Category:Video games where Recoome is playable Category:Video games where Tien Shinhan is playable Category:Video games where Future Trunks is playable Category:Video games where Vegeta is playable Category:Video games where Yamcha is playable Category:Video games where Zarbon is playable Category:Video Games with What-If Transformations